Mini Ninjas - First Look Preview

Devoting years to plotting ingenious ways to kill people probably wears on the soul. And then transforming these ideas into a visceral reality would possibly just make matters worse.

This is precisely what IO Interactive has been doing for the last decade with the Hitman franchise: taking inspired - if slightly twisted - ideas, such as steaming a guy to death in a sauna, and transforming them into realistic gameplay. Clearly, IO felt like they needed a well-earned break from the maiming and garrotting, and this break has taken the shape of Mini Ninjas.

Starting with the well-established idea that small equals cute, Mini Ninjas is determined to be adorable right from the outset. The opening cutscene combines charming, cell-shaded artwork with a Mr Miyagi-esque narration to create an instantly lovable world. Unfortunately for our heroes, this is a world where evil samurai are capturing animals (the horror!) and turning them into more evil minions. Enter Hiro and his best friend Futo, the last two ninjas that have survived the onslaught.

Just like the world he inhabits, Hiro looks very simple. Constructed from a handful of shapes, Hiro is more akin to Xbox Live Avatars than typical next-gen characters. However, the bold cell-shading used makes this deliberate styling look charming rather than lazy. The same is true of Hiro's environment.  For example, each blade of grass is a single shade of bright green, creating a remarkably vibrant world for him to run around in. Altogether the effect is that the Mini Ninjas' world looks like a fun place to be.

At this early stage all the enemies were variations on the traditional samurai theme seen in the trailer released earlier this year. While the enemy models, with their glowing yellow eyes and oversized heads do look great, the repetition of each enemy, only as a resized version, is a little worrying.

Armed with his katana, as far as we can tell Hiro unravels combos by repeatedly pressing a single button. On first appearances the game seems like traditional action-adventure fare but the combat variety lies in the range of ways to approach any given fight. For instance, Hiro can use the head-height grass to sneak up to enemies and assassinate them without being seen (back to familiar IO territory). Or if stealth isn't your thing, then Hiro has a mass of "Kuji" magic spells acquired through an exp system to deal with enemies.  Better yet, it is possible to simply change to another of six characters at any time - once they are unlocked - and use their unique abilities to deal with the problem. Futo, for example, who is available from the start, is cumbersome but deals more damage with his hefty hammer which is ideal for dispatching the larger, stronger enemies.

This freedom of approach also seems to be recreated in the mission structure. We were briefly shown a mission set in an enemy stronghold which can be infiltrated by stealth or broken into with brute force. The stealthy way involved jumping between rooftops, scaling the sewage system and tip-toeing along the tops of walls while guards patrolled below. The more direct approach involves the front door and liberal use of Futo's hammer.

Despite Futo's best efforts, the enemies don't actually die, instead, with a puff of smoke they transform back into the animal they were originally before hopping happily away (Sonic anyone?). This might seem a bit cheesy by today's standards but IO has actually incorporated this into the gameplay rather than just leaving it as a visual effect. With the use of one of Hiro's kuji spells it's possible to possess and control any of the animals. After "killing" a few enemies we saw how Hiro can possess a bear to maul enemies, or even better, a boar to bulldoze straight through them. And at the other end of a the spectrum we're shown how Hiro can take control of a chicken that can lay eggs for the hell of it, or use its heightened chicken senses to find valuable flowers. Unfortunately the demonstration of this skill stopped there, but there is a tantalising number of different animals waiting to be taken over in the game. It's this level of variety that could make Mini Ninjas a great game.

Importantly though, no matter how the objective was being carried out, it always appeared quite easy and although it's very early days this could leave hardcore gamers wanting more. Features like Hiro's meditation skill, which shows you the direction of your objective, add a level of accessibility to the game that has become more popular with casual gamers, and this title, like Fable 2, could bridge the gap between the casual and hardcore markets - easy to pick up, but hard to put down.

Like the visuals the game's audio is very distinctive. In particular, the voices seem pitch-perfect for the game. Drones squawk "ninjaaaa" as they attack, and talk to each other in sped-up Japanese while their superiors chastise them with brilliant angry tirades. Even small sound effects like the breakneck pitter-patter of Hiro's run or the occasional woodpecker knocking compliment the look of the game.

To bring the presentation to a close we're shown a boss fight. This was basically a huge gorilla skinned with a samurai outfit again. In this battle, rather than duking it out, Hiro has to make use of the environment to bring down the impossibly big samurai. By hiding behind a pillar, Hiro suckers the boss into taking a swing at him and consequently getting his sword stuck in the pillar. By quickly climbing onto his sword, a button sequence is initiated which appears on the screen and corresponds to Hiro jumping all over the boss until he finally pulls down his pants. This scenario is repeated a number of times, with increasingly difficult obstacles thrown into the mix, such as the appearance of hordes of archers, until he is ultimately taken down.

Mini Ninjas is full of little quirks that could make this game an off-beat success. It's the small touches like Hiro being able to use his oversized, bowl-shaped hat as a tiny boat even though he can swim that win you over. Together with the visuals and audio, this makes for a game that looks like it has real personality. Even from this brief first look Mini Ninjas is a title we're getting excited about. Expect release towards the end of 2009.